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February, 2008:

Anti-Smoking Bill Passed in Bahrain

Feb 20th, 2008
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Anti-Smoking Bill Passed

Gulf Daily News – The Voice of Bahrain – Published: 20th February 2008

MPs yesterday approved a tough anti-smoking law that includes fines for people who light up in cars with children on board.

Traders who sell tobacco to children below 14 years could also face up to six months in jail under the new legislation.

It is already illegal to sell tobacco products to anyone below 18 years.

Restaurants that fail to properly separate smoking and non-smoking areas will be fined BD2,000 to BD5,000 and closed for up to two months for repeat offences.

Smokers who light up in closed areas, such as cars with children onboard, buses, malls and other places, would face fines of BD20 to BD50.

The government drafted the law in 1994, but it has still not seen the light.

The new draft is a combination of the original draft and a parliamentary proposed law.

It will now be discussed and voted on by the Shura Council, before being sent to His Majesty King Hamad for ratification.

Drug Cases Up 9% In 2007

Feb 20th, 2008
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Below is an exchange of emails in regards to the total seizure of genuine/counterfeit illicit cigarettes between James Middleton of Clear The Air Hong Kong and J A Moosa of the Excise Statistics and Research Division for Commissioner of Customs & Excise.

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Sent: Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Dear James,

Thank you again for your e-mail of 18.2.2008.

Our department does not keep statistics on the total seizure of genuine/counterfeit illicit cigarettes but only individual significant
cases.

The total transhipment cigarettes that passed through Hong Kong in 2007 were 22,155.13 million sticks.

Seized cigarettes will be destroyed subsequent to court proceedings.

The origin port is difficult to determine as the seized cigarettes often traversed through a number of countries before their inception in Hong Kong, plus that the shipping documents are often forged.

I hope the above information will be helpful to you.

Regards
(J A Moosa)
Excise Statistics and Research Division
for Commissioner of Customs & Excise

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Sent: Monday, February 18, 2008

Dear Jeffrey

Many thanks for this information.

Can you tell us which of the illicit cigarettes were genuine product and which were counterfeits ?

This would be most beneficial to the authors of the Tobacco Atlas

Normally 1 x 40′ container contains 960 cases of 10,000 sticks (9.68 million sticks / 40′) so the seizure equates to 11.493 containers or appox one per month.

Does Customs keep statistics of legal transhipments of cigarettes through Hong Kong ? If so what are the numbers please ?

What happens to the seized illicit cargo ?

Of the seized shipments in the port, what is the main origin of the shipments ?

http://www.who.int/tobacco/statistics/tobacco_atlas/en/

kind regards

James Middleton
www.cleartheair.org.hk
Clear the Air

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Sent: Monday, February 18, 2008

Dear James,

Thank you for your e-mail of 15.2.2008 enquiring the statistics of illicit and duty-paid cigarettes in 2006 and 2007.

The illicit cigarettes cases effected by the department in 2007 was down 41% when comparing with 2006, whereas the illicit cigarettes seized in 2007 had increased by 39.45 million sticks when comparing those seized in 2006.

It was because there were a number of cases involving substantial amount of illicit cigarettes (under transhipment) intercepted by Customs officers at the container port.

The total illicit cigarettes seized in 2007 were 111.26 million sticks.

The total duty-paid cigarettes in 2007 were 3,495.73 million sticks.

I hope you find the above information useful.

Regards
(J A Moosa)
Excise Statistics and Research Division
for Commissioner of Customs & Excise.

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Sent: Friday, February 15, 2008

Dear Sir,

I refer to the Government press release below. It states illicit cigarette cases were down 41% but the data provided by SCMP shows 45 million more illicit cigarettes were seized in 11 months of 2007 than the whole 12 months of 2006.

Can you clarify this please ? What was the final illicit cigarette number for 2007 ?

It also shows that even though there was a partial smoking ban in place during 2007, the total duty paid tobacco increased by 12 million sticks between January and November 2007. What was the final figure of duty paid cigarettes in 2007 please ?

kind regards

James Middleton
Clear the Air
www.cleartheair.org.hk

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Law and Order – news.gov.hk – Published on the 1st Feb 2008

The Customs & Excise Department detected 695 drug-trafficking cases in 2007, up 9% over a year earlier. There were 627 arrests, five drug storage and distribution centre closures, and three indoor cannabis plantations shut down.

At a year-end briefing today Customs Commissioner Richard Yuen said the amount of cannabis, cocaine and ice – or methylamphetamine – seized was higher than in 2006, but the amount of ketamine, ecstasy and heroin was on the decline.

He recalled the biggest-ever transnational cocaine trafficking case in which Customs was involved, last July, in which 160kg of cocaine with an estimated value of $110 million was uncovered inside secret compartments in some incoming containers from Panama.

As there has been an upward trend of youth engaging in drug abuse despite a drop in the overall number of drug addicts, Mr Yuen pledged his department would contribute to the work of the Task Force on Youth Drug Abuse and step up measures against cross-boundary drug trafficking and drug abuse.

Stepped-up checks

“We have increased random inspections of cross-boundary vehicles, especially cross-boundary coaches, and will carry out more joint operations with Shenzhen Customs to provide a stronger deterrence against youths engaging in cross-boundary drug abuse,” he said.

On smuggling, the department detected 172 cases last year, down 15.7% on 2006. Of these, 82 involved smuggling across a land boundary while 90 were carried out at sea. Goods seized valued a total of $435 million, and 352 people were arrested.

The most common goods smuggled out of Hong Kong, mainly into the Mainland, were high-end and high-value consumer products such as computer accessories and electronic products and appliances. Usual items smuggled into Hong Kong were cigarettes, counterfeit and infringing articles.

To prevent food smuggling, Mr Yuen said relevant departments – including the Food & Environmental Hygiene Department and Agriculture, Fisheries & Conservation Department – will work closely to ensure food safety.

Surveillance stepped up

A task force has recently been set up to co-ordinate inter-departmental efforts and communication with industries to enhance the effectiveness of enforcement action against food-smuggling activities, he added.

Turning to the protection of intellectual property rights, the Commissioner said there is a rising trend of people using the Internet to market and sell infringing articles. The number of cases climbed 50%, to 27 from 18 in 2006. More than 4 million pirated optical discs were also seized last year.

His department has tightened surveillance and enforcement action and will work closely with auction website operators to identify effective measures to curb such activities. Raids against shops and hawker stalls selling counterfeit goods during festivals will also be stepped up.

Consumer protection

After unscrupulous jewellery and electronic product shops deceived a spate of Mainland tourists last year, Mr Yuen looked forward to this year’s upcoming passing of the Trade Descriptions (Amendment) Bill, to enable Customs to more easily prosecute offenders.

He noted a court fined a jewellery shop involved in such improper sales practices $100,000 last year and sentenced its director to six months in jail.

Illicit cigarette cases were down 41% and those of illicit fuel down 3% over the previous year. The number of public complaints about such cases also dropped, 34% and 15%.

On the overall situation in Hong Kong, Mr Yuen said it remained under control and showed no sign of deterioration from last year. His department will continue to clamp down on illegal activities and step up enforcement.

Nicotine Nation

Feb 20th, 2008
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SCMP David Eimer
Feb 20, 2008

A pall of smoke has been hanging over mainland cities for the past two weeks and, for once, it’s not pollution. Instead, it’s the acrid residue of the millions of fireworks and cigarettes that go up in smoke every Lunar New Year. The tobacco industry gets a massive boost during the holiday season, with cigarettes a favoured gift, and fireworks remain enormously popular despite the many deaths they cause.

In fact, it’s a surprise that more people don’t die from stray rockets. In Foshan last week, 15,000 cartons of fireworks exploded in a blast equal to a 1.1 magnitude earthquake that was felt as far away as Guangzhou. Typically, the explosion was caused by carelessly discarded cigarettes. But fireworks deaths are nothing compared with the 1 million people who die of smoking-related diseases each year. With 350 million smokers on the mainland, that death rate is expected to rise to more than 2 million by 2020.

All of which is at odds with the ethos of the Beijing Olympics. The arrival of the Games in China was supposed to herald a new age in public health, according to Vice-Minister of Health Gao Qiang . At the end of last year, he vowed to use the Olympics to improve public health. Last week, the World Health Organisation called for a concerted anti-smoking campaign.

So far, all authorities have done is ban smoking in the Olympic Village, as well as at the competition venues and the hotels where people involved with the Games will stay. But banning smoking in the Olympic Village is like banning razors in Afghanistan; it is unnecessary. Instead, it’s on the streets of Beijing and other cities that the government needs to concentrate its efforts.

It is true that Beijing’s taxi drivers face fines of 200 yuan if they are caught smoking in their cabs, but, like the much-vaunted 50-yuan fine for spitting, in practice no one gets penalised. Nor has the idea of making restaurants in the capital non-smoking been greeted with enthusiasm. At Beijing’s first smoke-free eaterie, customers have taken to locking the waitresses out of the VIP rooms while they have a quick puff.

Such is the lack of awareness about using the Olympics to spread the non-smoking message that a recent sohu.com survey showed almost 8 per cent of respondents still think smoking isn’t harmful. It also showed that half of all smokers couldn’t contemplate giving up as they were afraid of offending people who offered them a cigarette at times like the Lunar New Year.

Some would say this ignorance suits the government. After all, the mainland is responsible for one-third of the world’s tobacco production, all government controlled and worth 500 billion yuan a year. But putting revenue ahead of the public’s health is cynical in the extreme. With the Olympics less than six months away, it’s time the authorities put the same effort into combating smoking that they have into building a Beijing fit for the Games.

David Eimer is a Beijing-based journalist

EU Panel Says Oral Tobacco Is Addictive, Hazardous

Feb 19th, 2008
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(Update2) – By Thomas Mulier

Feb. 19 (Bloomberg) — Swedish-style snuff hasn’t been proven to help people quit smoking, a European Union panel said, dealing a blow to tobacco companies that lobbied for lifting a ban on the product.

Smokeless tobacco is addictive and hazardous to health, the committee said in a report on its Web site. Evidence that the snuff, known as snus, may help Swedish smokers stop isn’t sufficient to lift an EU ban because it’s “not possible to extrapolate the patterns of tobacco use” to other countries, the committee said.

Snus is a moist form of snuff that is placed between the upper lip and gums rather than sniffed. The tobacco industry, led by British American Tobacco Plc and Swedish Match AB, has been lobbying the EU to lift the ban, which applies to all members of the bloc except Sweden. Cigarette makers have been moving into smokeless tobacco products, trying to create a new market as public smoking restrictions spread through the U.S. and Europe.

“This conclusion implies that there will be no impetus for a change in policy for a lifting of the ban,” wrote David Hayes, an analyst at Lehman Brothers who has an “overweight” rating on Swedish Match.

The EU banned snus for health reasons before Sweden joined. The country negotiated an exception to the rule when it became a member, becoming the only EU nation where the product can be sold legally.

Shares Fall

Swedish Match shares fell 4 kronor, or 2.8 percent, to 138 kronor in Stockholm, where the company is based. That gives the company a market value of about 36.8 billion kronor ($5.84 billion). London-based BAT declined 19 pence to 1,825 pence in London.

Studies show that all smokeless tobacco products contain carcinogens and may cause cancer of the pancreas, the committee said. Research indicates some kinds of oral tobacco are associated with a “high” risk for mouth cancer, though it hasn’t been proven for snus, the panel added. Smokeless tobacco also may increase the risk of death after a heart attack, the committee said.

Snus is at least 50 percent less likely to lead to heart disease than cigarettes, and possibly 100 percent less likely to lead to lung cancer, the committee said.

“Politicians must now decide on whether it is reasonable to continue to deny European smokers access to a dramatically less hazardous alternative to cigarettes,” Lars Rutqvist, vice president for scientific affairs at Swedish Match, said in a statement. “This is probably only the first step in a long political process.”

Benefits, Risk

The benefits of lifting a ban would be offset by the risk that consumers who might never have smoked would start using snus, or that consumers who quit smoking for the product would continue using it indefinitely, the panel said.

Some evidence from the U.S. suggests that smokeless tobacco use may lead to cigarette smoking, while Swedish data don’t support this conclusion, the report said. Cultural differences “suggest caution in translating findings across countries” and there are no randomized trials on smokeless tobacco as a cigarette substitute.

“We will continue to engage with the European Commission — encouraging them and others to support the replacement of the current ban with a regulatory framework that allows the sale of snus,” Chris Proctor, BAT’s head of science and regulation, said in a statement. The Brussels-based commission is the EU’s executive.

To contact the reporter on this story: Thomas Mulier in Geneva at tmulier@bloomberg.net .

Last Updated: February 19, 2008 11:46 EST

Research on Youth Smoking for the Tobacco Industry

Feb 19th, 2008
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UC Continues to Act in Secrecy, Doing Research on Youth Smoking for the Tobacco Industry

By Leland Yee, Ph.D.
Assistant President pro Tem
California State Senate

Earlier this month, the Los Angeles Times uncovered a smoldering controversy regarding tobacco industry funded research at the University of California (UC). It is puzzling how, in good conscience, the UC can accept such money from a company with an extensive and documented history of marketing their addictive product to teens.

In fact, in August 2006, a federal court condemned the tobacco industry’s grant research programs as self-serving investments designed to mislead the public and distort public policy. In addition, the US President’s Cancer Panel recommends that recipients of National Cancer Institute grants be prohibited from accepting money from the tobacco industry. Furthermore, prestigious institutions across the world have declared that taking money from the tobacco industry for research is against the mission and purpose of their university.

In spite of this overwhelming condemnation of tobacco industry dollars supporting research, in September the UC Board of Regents ignored the findings of legal and academic experts and voted to continue to do business with the tobacco industry through research grant funding.

Throughout the year-long debate on the issue of tobacco industry funding of research, the UC administration continually argued that the research conducted through tobacco industry-funded grants is transparent. This public university system claims that there is no need to deny tobacco funding or add special provisions to industry grants because all grants are open for the public to see.

Despite this argument, tobacco industry-funded research grants at UC have been anything but transparent. UCLA, mentioned in the federal racketeering case against the U.S. tobacco industry, is once again at the center of the conflict by refusing to open their tobacco-industry research to the public eye. The original controversy involved a tobacco-funded UCLA researcher’s conclusion that secondhand smoke was not harmful. This claim is exploited by the tobacco industry and used to defend smoking-related lawsuits throughout the world. The most recent dilemma involves $6 million Philip Morris USA-funded grant to establish the Adolescent Smoking Cessation Center at UCLA.

UCLA has denied formal requests for information about its Adolescent Smoking Cessation Center. After receiving pressure, UCLA finally agreed to hand over a copy of the grant proposal to members of the public, but the University redacted a majority of the proposal with the exception of background information and budget justifications.

The level of redaction is alarming on a number of levels. First and foremost, Philip Morris – the world’s largest cigarette company and maker of the brand most popular with minors, has firsthand access to why and how youth get addicted and stay addicted to tobacco, yet a taxpayer-funded university will not share public information with interested citizens or public health professionals. This secrecy, on behalf of tobacco giant Philip Morris, leads to speculation that the UC is doing something it doesn’t want the general public to know about.

It cannot be ignored that youth smoking prevention programs funded by the tobacco giant actually promote youth addiction to tobacco rather than prevent it.

It is long overdue for the University of California – a public, taxpayer supported system – to stop doing their business in secret and it is even more imperative that they stop doing research on youth smoking for the tobacco industry.

Leland Yee is a member of the California State Senate Democratic Leadership team and the Assistant President pro Tem of the Senate. Senator Yee is also a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley.

Posted on February 19, 2008

China Aims for National Chain of Anti-Smoking Clinics

Feb 18th, 2008
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CRI – February 18, 2008

China will survey smoking habits among key sectors, including doctors and teachers, in 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities this year as it works to establish a national network of anti-smoking clinics.

The goal is to have at least one outpatient facility in each province, where smokers would be offered a combination of medical and psychological treatment depending on their nicotine dependence.

The survey, whose parameters were yet to be determined, would study whether people knew of the risks of smoking and how to stop, according to the Department of Maternal and Child Health Care and Community Health of China’s Ministry of Health.

China has 350 million smokers, whose numbers are growing by more than 3 million a year. There are 50 million teen-aged smokers as well. The number of non-smokers in China affected by passive smoking was 540 million as of 2007, one-third of whom were under 18 years old.

What these numbers mean is that about two-thirds of the population either smokes or is affected by those who do.

Each year, second-hand smoking kills more than 100,000 people, the ministry estimated in a 2007 report.

Nonetheless, there aren’t many outpatient anti-smoking clinics, even in a city like Beijing. In the capital, for example, 22 clinics were set up in 1996, but only three remain.

Other planned anti-smoking measures would be no-smoking workplaces and educational efforts in the school system. And of course, the Olympics are to be promoted as smoke-free.

China has also made efforts to reduce support for tobacco product makers. In May 2003, the government signed the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which took effect two years later and helped limit the promotion of domestic tobacco enterprises.

Vic Anti-Smoking Groups Lobbying For Ban Extension

Feb 18th, 2008
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ABC News – February 18, 2008 – Jane Cowan

There has been a victory in the battle against smoking, with new figures showing that young people are butting out in record numbers.

In the last 12 months in Victoria, there has been a 30 per cent drop in the number of 18 to 29-year-olds lighting up.

The figures are the first snapshot of smoking rates since cigarettes were banned in bars and clubs in the state last July.

New South Wales and Western Australia also introduced bans at that time, prohibiting smoking in all enclosed areas.

Anti-smoking groups say the new laws are working, and should be tightened even further.

The latest anti-smoking advertisement to be launched onto Victorian television features a smoker squirming on an operating table, as a bronchoscopy tube is forced down her throat.

“By the time most lung cancers are discovered, it’s already too late to operate,” the advertisement says.

It is unpleasant to watch, and unpleasant to listen to.

But the scare tactics will not be needed for 30 per cent of Victorian smokers, aged between 18 and 29, who, according to new statistics, have stopped smoking in the last 12 months.

Executive director of Quit, Fiona Sharkie, says the changes can be partly attributed to the introduction of smoking bans.

“We know that compliance has been very high, that pubs and clubs and people were certainly ready for it,” she said.

“We knew in that age group of young people, 50 per cent of those people said they were planning to quit smoking once the bans came in.

“There was some preparation work done there that prepared people and young people about preparing to quit, but I think we’ll see how that’s really going to play out in the next surveys to come in the following years.”

Tasmania was the first state to ban smoking in pubs and clubs in 2006, followed the same year by Queensland and the ACT.

Western Australia and New South Wales both went smoke free with Victoria in July last year.

The Northern Territory is now the only place where you can still have a cigarette with your beer.

But in most places, there has been no data on smoking rates collected since the bans making it difficult to ascertain the impact they are having on people’s habits.

In Queensland though, an independent study found 22 per cent of smokers tried to quit in direct response to the new laws, and 14,000 of them succeeded.

Anita Tang chairs the National Tobacco Issues Committee at the Cancer Council of Australia, and says she is not surprised by the data.

“We know that for young adults in particular, we have often considered pubs and clubs to be mercenaries for smokers in a way,” she said.

“It’s where young people who are at the experimental stage of smoking spend their time and socialise, and if they are surrounded by other people who are also smoking, it’s much more likely that they will smoke themselves.”

The director of National Affairs at the Australian Hotels Association, Bill Healey, says there has been a significant shift from indoor to outdoor activity.

“That cost the industry a lot of money in terms of renovations to enable hotels to accommodate the new laws, and in some states such as New South Wales it’s been estimated in the vicinity of $750,000 for the club and hotel sector,” he said.

Balancing act

Ms Tang from the Cancer Council, says the bans should be extended.

“The way that the respective governments have defined the areas where you can and can’t smoke does still leave a lot of people exposed to smoke,” she said.

“In some states, particularly in New South Wales, a lot of pubs and clubs have actually created pseudo outdoor areas, which we believe don’t actually address the public health issue.”

But a tightening of the bans is that last thing pubs and clubs want to see.

“Unfortunately our venues are probably some of the more high-profile areas at the moment, where the smoking issue is getting some publicity and therefore we are being pulled into the broader debate about smoking in the community,” he said.

“It is unfortunate for us because we’ve done everything required by the Government to satisfy their needs in relation to smoking in enclosed areas.

“We’ve invested to make our venues suitable to the news laws and to our patrons, and it is disappointing that the anti-smoking lobby hasn’t recognised the efforts we’ve gone to.”

Britain May Introduce Permits To Buy Cigarettes

Feb 16th, 2008
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16 Feb, 2008, 0740 hrs IST, PTI – The Economic Times

LONDON: Smokers in Britain may soon need a permit worth 10 pounds to buy cigarettes.

Health England, the government’s health advisory body, has suggested introducing the permit without which no one would be allowed to buy cigarettes.

“The scheme would make a big difference to the number of people giving up smoking,” Chairman of the advisory body Julian Le Grand told BBC Radio 5 Live.

“The cash raised by the proposed scheme would go to the National Health Scheme,” Le Grand, an ex-adviser to former Prime Minister Tony Blair, said.

But smokers’ rights group, Freedom Organisation for the Right to Enjoy Smoking (FOREST), described the idea as “outrageous”, given the high prices smokers already pay.

Le Grand said the idea is that inconvenience in getting a permit – as well as the cost – would deter people from persisting with the smoking habit.

“You’ve got to get a form, the government’s good at complex forms; you have got to get a photograph. It’s a little bit of a problem to actually do it, so you have got to make a conscious decision every year to opt in to being a smoker,” he said.

About 70 per cent of smokers actually want to stop smoking. So if you just make it that little bit more difficult for them to actually re-start or even to start in the first place, yes I think it will make a big difference, he added.

A Department of Health spokesperson did not rule out such a scheme as part of the next wave of tobacco regulation.

She said: “We will be consulting later this year on the next steps on tobacco control. Ministers are seeking input from a whole range of stakeholders.”

Tobacco Groups (Could) Face Fines Over Contraband

Feb 16th, 2008
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By Frances Williams in Geneva – The Financial Times

Published: February 16 2008 02:00 | Last updated: February 16 2008 02:00

Tobacco companies could be made responsible for clamping down on cigarette smuggling, with stiff financial penalties for failure, under proposed guidelines for a new global treaty to tackle the multi-billion dollar illicit trade in tobacco products.

The trade is estimated to deprive national exchequers worldwide of $40bn-$50bn (£20bn-£25bn) in lost taxes every year and undermines the drive to raise cigarette prices, which experts say is the single most effective way of deterring people from smoking, especially the young.

At the end of a week of negotiations in Geneva involving about 130 countries, delegates said yesterday there was broad agreement to require companies to track and trace tobacco products from manufacture to point of sale and fine them if contraband is seized.

The proposals are modelled on an existing agreement between 26 of the 27 European Union countries (excluding the UK) and two tobacco companies, Philip Morris International and Japan Tobacco International, that has already led to a big decline in cigarette seizures in the EU.

The negotiations, conducted under the auspices of the World Health Organisation, marked the first step towards a legally binding protocol on illicit tobacco trade under the WHO’s 152-member Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which took effect in 2005.

Other measures envisaged for the protocol, scheduled for adoption in 2010, include strengthened international co-operation to prosecute smuggling gangs, tougher penalties for offenders and better law enforcement, and help for poorer countries to put the measures into effect.

Ian Walton-Georges of the EU’s anti-fraud office, who chaired the negotiations, said he planned to draft a protocol that was “practical, effective and strong” ahead of a second round of negotiations later this year.

The Framework Convention Alliance, a coalition of some 300 anti-tobacco groups, says the global illicit trade – dominated by organised criminal gangs – may have amounted to nearly 11 per cent of total sales, or 600bn cigarettes, in 2006.

Contraband trade is particularly rife in Russia and other countries in eastern Europe, in Latin America, and especially Brazil, and in Africa and the Middle East.

Smoke Bans Deter Young

Feb 15th, 2008
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Article from: Herald Sun Australia – Grant McArthur

February 15, 2008 12:00am

BANS in pubs and clubs have helped reduce the number of young smokers by 30 per cent in the past year.

The number of 18-29 year olds smoking dropped from 26.2 per cent in 2006, to 18.6 per cent in 2007, figures released by Quit Victoria revealed yesterday.

Smoking was banned in Victoria’s 7000 pubs, clubs, gaming rooms and cigar bars on July 1 last year.

Overall, the number of Victorians smoking has dropped from 21.3 per cent in 1998, to 17.3 per cent last year.

But tobacco is still responsible for 4000 deaths in Victoria each year and costs the health system $5 billion annually, prompting a graphic new advertising campaign to further lower smoking rates.

A new ad will hit TV screens this weekend, centring on the whistling noise of a woman breathing — the sound of air passing around a tumour as it tries to enter her lungs.

It is a noise Associate Professor David Ball from Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre hears all too often. “I’ve seen cancers the size of grapefruit in lungs and the person is not aware of it being there,” he said. “Approximately 11 per cent of patients will survive five years and that compares with an overall 60 per cent survival for all cancers. “The human stories I see occur in people who may have given up smoking 20 or 30 years ago, but because of lifestyle choice they made then they are now afflicted by a disease, which in most instances is fatal.”

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